The development of automatic and controlled inhibitory retrieval processes in true and false recall

In three experiments, we investigated the role of automatic and controlled inhibitory retrieval processes in true and false memory development in children and adults. Experiment 1 incorporated a directed forgetting task to examine controlled retrieval inhibition. Experiments 2 and 3 used a part-set cue and retrieval practice task to examine automatic retrieval inhibition. In the first experiment, the forget cue had no effect on false recall for adults but reduced false recall for children. In Experiments 2 and 3, both tasks caused retrieval impairments for true and false recall, and this occurred for all age groups. Implicit inhibition, which occurs outside of our conscious control, appears early in childhood. However, because young children do not process false memories as automatically as adults, explicit inhibition can reduce false memory output.     

Eye movements during transitive action observation have sequential structure

In this paper, we explore how observers of a reach-to-grasp action can identify and distinguish between the agent and patient (i.e. target) of the action. We investigate the hypothesis that there is a characteristic sequential structure to the observer’s pattern of saccades, with the agent being fixated first, and then the target. We report an experiment which indicates that this sequence of saccades, while not ubiquitous, is overwhelmingly more likely than chance. The experiment also sheds some light on the mechanisms which allow the observer to saccade from the agent of the action to the target.     

The fallibility of memory in judicial processes: Lessons from the past and their modern consequences

The capability of adult and child witnesses to accurately recollect events from the past and provide reliable testimony has been hotly debated for more than 100 years. Prominent legal cases of the 1980s and 1990s sparked lengthy debates and important research questions surrounding the fallibility and general reliability of memory. But what lessons have we learned, some 35 years later, about the role of memory in the judicial system? In this review, we focus on what we now know about the consequences of the fallibility of memory for legal proceedings. We present a brief historical overview of false memories that focuses on three critical forensic areas that changed memory research: children as eyewitnesses, historic sexual abuse and eyewitness (mis)identification. We revisit some of the prominent trials of the 1980s and 1990s to not only consider the role false memories have played in judicial decisions, but also to see how this has helped us understand memory today. Finally, we consider the way in which the research on memory (true and false) has been successfully integrated into some courtroom procedures.     

The effect of limited attention and delay on negative arousing false memories

ABSTRACT

Previous research has shown that, in comparison to neutral stimuli, false memories for high arousing negative stimuli are greater after very fast presentation and limited attention at study. However, full compared to limited attention conditions still produce comparably more false memories for all stimuli types. Research has also shown that emotional stimuli benefit from a period of consolidation. What effect would such consolidation have on false memory formation even when attention is limited at study? The aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of fast presentation on false memory production for negatively-arousing and neutral items over time using the DRM paradigm. Sixty-eight participants studied Negative and neutral DRM lists with fast or slow presentation conditions. Half completed a recognition test immediately and half completed a recognition test after one-week. Results revealed that, for fast presentation, negative critical lures increased after one week and were comparable to negative critical lures in the slow presentation encoding conditions. Neutral critical lures in the fast presentation condition did not change and remained lower compared to the slow presentation condition. These findings are the first demonstration that arousing negative false memories can increase over time when attention at encoding is limited.     

Notions of Destiny in Women's Self-Construction

Robert K. C. Forman, Mysticism, Mind, Consciousness. Albany, State University of New York Press, 1999, x+214 pp., $49.50 (hardback) ISBN 0 7914 4169 5, $16.96 (paperback) ISBN 0 7914 4170 9.

Deborah F. Sawyer and Diane M. Collier (eds), Is There a Future for Feminist Theology? Sheffield, Sheffield Academic Press, 1999, 210 pp., £35.00, $57.50 (hardback) ISBN 1 85075 963 4, £14.95, $24.75 (paperback) ISBN 1 85075 979 0.

Adnan Aslan, Religious Pluralism in Christian and Islamic Philosophy: The Thought of John Hick and Seyyed Hossein Nasr. Richmond, Curzon, 1998, £45.00 ISBN 0 7007 1025 6.

Carol S. Anderson, Pain and its Ending: The Four Noble Truths in the Theravada Buddhist Canon. Richmond, Curzon, 1999, xi+255 pp., £40.00 ISBN 0 7007 1065 5.

Michael P. Morrisey, Consciousness and Transcendence: The Theology of Eric Voegelin. Notre Dame, IN, University of Notre Dame Press, 1994, xiii+334 pp., $41.95 ISBN 0 268 00793 4.

Robert A. Segal, Theorizing About Myth. Amherst, University of Massachusetts Press, 1999, $50.00 (hardback) ISBN 1 55849 194 5, $15.95 (paperback) ISBN 1 55849 191 0.

Eleanor Abdella Doumato, Getting God's Ear: Women, Islam, and Healing in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf. New York, Columbia University Press, 2000, xiv+312 pp. $45.00, £28.50 (hardback) ISBN 0231 11666 7, $18.50, £12.00 (paperback) ISBN 0231 11667 5.

Thomas A. Carlson, Indiscretion: Finitude and the Naming of God. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1999, xiv+307 pp., $45.00, £35.95 (hardback) ISBN 0226 09293 3, $18.00, £14.50 (paperback) ISBN 0226 09294 1.

Harold D. Roth, Original Tao: Inward Training and the Foundations of Taoist Mysticism. New York, Columbia University Press, 1999, xvii+294 pp., $29.50, £19.00 ISBN 0231 11564 4.     

CAN SPATIAL TRAINING ERASE THE GENDER DIFFERENCES ON THE WATER-LEVEL TASK?

Spatial training has been only modestly effective at improving the performance of adolescents and adults on the water-level task. Based on previous findings with the task, a self-discovery training procedure was developed that involved having participants proceed from easier to more difficult problems along a dimension of increasingly greater competing perceptual cues. The training was effective in (a) eliminating the gender differences on the drawing task, and (b) significantly improving females' knowledge of the physical (invariance) principle, although not to the level of males. Training effects did not transfer to a related spatial task.     

A comparison of the thurstone method of multiple factors with the hotelling method of principal components

The factors found by the Hotelling method of principal components present the same necessity for rotation as those found by the Thurstone method of multiple factors.The Thurstone method of multiple factors is here found superior to the Hotelling method of principal components, and is suggested as the method of choice for all problems requiring the determination of elemental components from a group of related variables, since it was found on every point of comparison that, when applied to a correlation matrix of unknown communalities, the Thurstone method was more accurate than the Hotelling method, and also required much less time.     

Eyewitness memory: The impact of a negative mood during encoding and/or retrieval upon recall of a non-emotive event

The police often appeal for eyewitnesses to events that were unlikely to have been emotive when observed. An eyewitness, however, may be in a negative mood whilst encoding or retrieving such events as mood can be influenced by a range of personal, social, and environmental factors. For example, bad weather can induce a negative mood. This experiment compared the impact of negative and neutral moods during encoding and/or retrieval upon eyewitness recall of a non-emotive event. A negative mood during encoding had no impact upon the number of correct details recalled (provided participants were in a neutral mood at retrieval) but a negative mood during retrieval impaired the number of correct details recalled (provided participants were in a neutral mood at encoding). A negative mood at both time points enhanced the number of correct details recalled, demonstrating a mood-dependent memory enhancement. The forensic implications of these findings are discussed.